Monday, January 17, 2011

Yesterday afternoon I was in the kitchen, and I glanced out the window and saw a black dog coming up from the neighbor's driveway (this is down across the street, about 300 ft away). I knew that neighbor has yellow labs, so it wasn't his dog. As I watched the dog got up on the street and started zig-zagging around, and as cars drove by he'd hopefully run towards them. Clearly this dog was lost and didn't know what to do. Sometimes you see dogs that confidently go exploring, and their owners seem to have no problem with that (country folks!) but this wasn't one of those.

I grabbed a coat and shoes and hurried down to the road as he was heading towards where the main road for our neighborhood meets the busy street at the bottom of the hill (where he was). I called and clapped and whistled, and the dog looked at me and kept going with a determined look. I hurried down there but by the time I got to the road he was gone. I called Dave and told him about it. I went online and looked for lost dog reports but couldn't find any.

A couple hours later Dave and I were heading into town, and about a mile from the house I saw a black speck on the road far ahead, so we went that way and sure enough, it was the dog. Now I got a better look, she was a black/blue heeler. She had two collars, but no visible tags. I got out of the car and tried to go to her, but she was scared. Her tail was between her legs, and she looked at me like she wanted to come, but it was just too scary. I couldn't get within 15 feet of her and she'd turn and run. We spent a bit of time trying to get closer to her. Unfortunately we had no food with us, and no leash to put her on if we did get close, and we were far enough from home that if we'd gone back to get food and a leash I doubt we'd be lucky enough to find her again. Finally we had to give up and continue on. She continued trotting down the street, a black dog heading off into the black, rainy night.

I hope she spent the night safe in someone's yard. Unless she decided to trust someone, I don't think anyone is going to catch her unless she corners herself in a fenced area or get's too tired to run. Poor dog. I thought about her all night. I would be devastated if I lost one of my dogs. I think they are all friendly enough they would go to a stranger if one tried to help them. I sure hope so. I would hate to know someone was so close to rescuing them, but just couldn't get near.